Introduction
In today’s innovative business environment, creating and maintaining a strong company image is essential for stable subsequent development and competition in the market. In this regard, it is of great importance for management to have timely and quick access to important information regarding the state of development and positioning of the organization. This up-to-date information can play an essential role in helping to make crucial decisions regarding the course and direction of the company for its best development (Baltzan & Philips, 2022). To better understand these processes, it is necessary to identify and study five areas of public information relevant to the health of the business and its employees, as well as designate a system for processing data.
Key Public Information Sources for Business Insight
Stock market performance is the first area of publicly available important information that can be accumulated. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) is an important and one of the most indicative parameters of the stock market. This characteristic contains information regarding the weighted average share price of 30 large organizations on two specialized and most developed exchanges, such as the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and the Nasdaq (Khan et al., 2019). Changes in this indicator may indicate shifts in global attitudes towards a particular company, which may indicate how much people trust it. Thus, if the stock price starts to fall sharply, this may signal a decrease in confidence, and management should take specific actions to improve the situation.
Social networks are the second area of important information that can be extracted from public resources. They are the global spokespersons for many people worldwide; accordingly, leaders can understand how their organization has a positive or negative rating. Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram accumulate much public opinion, which can be a backbone for understanding the dynamics of people’s sentiments towards big brands (Han et al., 2020).
Monitoring the management and direction of companies’ public image can also be based on data obtained from social networks, which are a tool for expressing the thoughts of many people, including service users. Tools for analyzing social networks and media resources, such as TV channels, can be used to track possible mentions of the company and reviews about it and its products. In this way, management can identify potential shortcomings in their current strategic activities and coordinate them in a different direction for improvement.
The third area from which useful public information can be extracted is linked to the third one, as users or bloggers review it. To date, several online review aggregators can play a significant role in the direction of the company’s development, as they help identify weaknesses and potential risks that the organization may go through in the future (Wang et al., 2021). Resources such as Yelp, TripAdvisor, and Google Reviews have large audiences of users who create reviews or visit these sites to learn more about a brand. With the increasing digitalization of the online space, resources with publications on specific topics or products can serve as an essential source of information. A negative reviewer’s opinion can significantly affect the company’s reputation and damage its commercial activities.
The fourth area of public information that can affect a company’s health is news articles. They can provide the necessary data about the market’s direction and what steps the organization has taken incorrectly, which is useful for developing a strategic direction (Wood et al., 2021). In addition, this source of information can also cover various events that can cause a particular market reaction or notify about possible or ongoing situations in the world that may affect the organization or industry. In order to make relevant decisions, management must keep abreast of events taking place in the world.
A fifth important area of research information that can impact a business’s health is website analytics. One example of such a resource would be Google Analytics, which shows up-to-date information regarding how many people visit the company’s website and what the actual conversion rate is (Baltzan & Philips, 2022). The organization can use the data collected from these resources to identify the company’s attractiveness factors and strengthen them to attract more customers.
Integrating Data Through a Centralized Dashboard
For effective interaction with all the proposed areas of information, a web system can be used that will reorganize all the data received from them and display it in one image. RSS feeds will be necessary as a connecting element to receive data from various sources simultaneously and without loss since they are the most reliable and standard solution (Baltzan & Philips, 2022). At the same time, the dashboard will be designed so as not to be overloaded with unnecessary technical information and present the most concise excerpts prepared for analysis.
The dashboard is the most critical element, and it should be divided into several main sectors, each of which will show relevant information from different sources. The first required section is indicators read from the stock market, which must indicate the company’s share price on the DJIA exchange. Another section should be devoted to mentioning the company on social networks, indicating negative or positive feedback. In this way, management will see customer trends and understand attitudes toward products and services. The online reviews section should have several sub-segments, each of which will display information on negative and positive reviews for the organization.
The next screen should contain data from news articles about events that may affect the company’s activities. At the same time, links to full articles should be provided for review. The last section should display data about the traffic to the company’s website and the most frequently viewed segments. This system can be useful in two main ways, one of which is to improve the overall health of a business.
Firstly, such an organization of data will allow management to receive comprehensive information about the current position of the company in the market (Baltzan & Philips, 2022). In this case, all information will be grouped in one place, which will allow the viewing of volumetric data arrays at once. Such a decision can save time and facilitate the decision-making process due to the visible results of the organization’s work. The second way the proposed solution is practical is that it will allow managers to track changes in the state of critical indicators that will be displayed in given sections. This will enable the highlighting of significant market trends and the analysis of ongoing changes.
Conclusion
In conclusion, a web information system that collects data from several important areas simultaneously can significantly impact a company’s overall performance. Summaries should be displayed in a concise form to be more grouped and visual and to provide more extensive information through links. Using this data aggregator program can significantly simplify the management of a company’s public image. A comprehensive view of the organization’s state in comparison with competitors and overall market performance can have a positive impact on the business’s health.
References
Baltzan, P. & Philips, A. (2022). Business-driven information systems, 8th ed. McGraw-Hill.
Han, X., Wang, J., Zhang, M., & Wang, X. (2020). Using social media to mine and analyze public opinion related to COVID-19 in China. International journal of environmental research and public health, 17(8), 2788. Web.
Khan, M. M. S., Ghayas, M. M., & Kashif, S. (2019). Why firms fail to sustain? Evidence from the Dow Jones Index. South Asian Journal of Management Sciences, 13(1), 116-136. Web.
Wang, Y., Cheng, Y., & Sun, J. (2021). When public relations meets social media: A systematic review of social media-related public relations research from 2006 to 2020. Public Relations Review, 47(4), 102081. Web.
Wood, B., Williams, O., Nagarajan, V., & Sacks, G. (2021). Market strategies used by processed food manufacturers to increase and consolidate their power: a systematic review and document analysis. Globalization and health, 17(1), 1-23. Web.